 Best Sellers
| | |  | |  | | | The Hearts of Horses | | SKU:
| | Availability:
Usually ships in 1 business days | | | Gloss's austere latest (after Wild Life) features a wandering taciturn tomboy who finds her place in rural Oregon while the men are away at war. After she leaves home in 1917, 19-year-old Martha Lessen plans to travel from farm to farm in Elwha County, Oregon, breaking horses left behind by owners away fighting. She winds up in small town Shelby, where farmers George and Louise Bliss convince her to stay the winter with them after she domesticates their broncos with soft words and songs instead of lariats and hobbles. While breaking the town's horses, Martha meets a slovenly drunk, a clan of Western European immigrants and two unmarried sisters running a ranch with the help of an awkward, secretive teenager. When Martha's not making the rounds or riding through the Clarks Range, Louise tries her hand at socializing (or, perhaps, breaking) her, but Martha chafes at town dances, social outings and Louise's hand-me-down church dresses. Gloss's narrative is sometimes as slow as Martha's progress with the more recalcitrant beasts, but following stubborn, uncompromising Martha as she goes about her work provides its own unique pleasures. (Nov.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. | | | |
List Price:
| $24.00 | |
Our Price:
| $14.40
& eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping on orders over $25.
| |
You Save:
| $9.60 (40%)
| |
Shipping:
| |
| | |
|
| | Product Promotions | | |
| | Product Details | | Author: | Molly Gloss | | Hardcover: | 304 pages | | Publisher: | Houghton Mifflin | | Publication Date: | November 06, 2007 | | ISBN: | 0618799907 | | Package Length: | 8.3 inches | | Package Width: | 5.8 inches | | Package Height: | 1.1 inches | | Package Weight: | 0.9 pounds | | Average Customer Rating: |  based on 31 reviews |
| |
| | Customer Reviews | Average Customer Review:
Write an online review and share your thoughts with other customers.
 Finding A Way Oct 10, 2008
Martha Lessen leaves a brutal home to find her way back to the romantic old West of pulp fiction, pre-1917 style. Martha ends up in a small remote valley of north western Oregon at the beginning of WWI when the young men of the country side have entered the Army to make the world safe for democracy.
THE HEART OF HORSES is about her technique, skill, and gift for breaking horses with vivid factual accounts. But more importantly the story is about a young woman discovering herself and the world around her, during a time of war and hardship for those who remained on the land. It is the story of an English woman married to a second generation German, a woman who carries her husband through a bout with Cancer when there is no hope, a story of a mother facing old age with her children gone, two sisters who maintain their ranch alone, and a woman whose husband is an alcoholic.
These are all woman who created the heritage we have today and in many cases they did it alone.
It is not a book to be dismissed as being just about horses.
Writing as a Small BusinessSins of the Fathers: A Brewster County NovelNatchez Above The River: A Family's Survival In The Civil War
 DID NOT WANT THE BOOK TO END Sep 22, 2008
I STIMBLED UPON THIS BOOK BY ACCIDENT. WHAT A PLEASANT SURPRISE.MOLLY GLOSS MAY NOT BE THE MOST POLISHED WRITER BUT SHE CAN TELL A HEARTWARMING STORY.WHEN I FINISHED THE BOOK THE CHARACTERS FELT LIKE OLD FRIENDSTHAT I WOULD LIKE TO KNOW EVEN BETTER.
Lovely and quiet Sep 17, 2008
This slowly unwinding, gentle story, carefully and lovingly told, is reminiscent of both Owen Wister's The Virginian and Laura Ingalls Wilder's These Happy Golden Years. It was a pleasure becoming acquainted with the various characters, their thoughts and hopes and dreams. It was a pleasure to witness the budding romance between Henry and Martha, how shy they both were, how tender and sweet. I loved the history of the place and time, and I appreciated the author's ability to draw me into the story one layer at a time. Books that I have read that were written during that era about that era are in that same style, so it was really nice to read a contemporary author who writes about that era in that era's gentle style.
This is a good book for a rainy day, get a piece of cake and a cup of coffee, go wrap yourself in an afghan and get cozy in your favorite armchair, and then savor this story s-l-o-w-l-y.
Take the ride Sep 08, 2008
If you added equal measures of John Steinbeck and Willa Cather, you would have something close to the tone of this affecting novel.It is the author's determined sense of understatement that lends this book its' power and authentic sense of Western history.I found myself thinking about its' characters for weeks after I turned the last page.
When Horses Ruled Jul 21, 2008
This is a truly lovely book about a place and time in the American West, eastern Oregon at the turn of the century and through WWI. Martha Lessen, a girl 'broncbuster', is a character that you enjoy spending time with and the stories that Gloss tells about horses and the people of that time are wonderful. This isn't necessarily the book for a horse crazy girl, but rather one that is thoughtful and considers deeply the role that horses have played in American life. It has a gentle flow and a very satisfying end that makes this an enjoyable read.
| |
| |
| |  | |  |
|
| You may also like ...
|
